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The Federal Reserve Cartel Part III: The Roundtable & The Illuminati

FROM THE EDITOR: Dear reader, here we present the third part of the series The Federal Reserve Cartel. This one, just like the second part, is divided into four chapters. Here, we will share with you that unkown part of the story that has changed our lives so much.

In this second chapter of the third part of a four part series we will widely refer to a group of people who directly or indirectly pull the strings in our planet, the Illuminati.

by Dean Herdenson

— Children of the Roundtable elite are members of a Dionysian cult known as Children of the Sun. Initiates include Aldous Huxley, T. S. Eliot, D. H. Lawrence and H. G. Wells. Wells headed British intelligence during WWI. His books speak of a “one-world brain” and “a police of the mind”. William Butler Yeats, another Sun member, was a pal of Aleister Crowley. The two formed an Isis Cult based on a Madam Blavatsky manuscript, which called on the British aristocracy to organize itself into an Isis Aryan priesthood. Most prominent writers of English literature came from the ranks of the Roundtable. All promoted Empire expansion, however subtly. Blavatsky’s Theosophical Society and Bulwer-Lytton’s Rosicrucians joined forces to form the Thule Society out of which the Nazis emerged. [8]

Aleister Crowley formed the British parallel to the Thule Society, the Isis-Urania Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. He tutored LSD guru Aldus Huxley, who arrived in the US in 1952, the same year the CIA launched its MK-ULTRA mind control program with help from the Warburg-owned Swiss Sandoz Laboratories and Rockefeller cousin Allen Dulles- OSS Station Chief in Berne. Dulles received information from the Muslim Brotherhood House of Saudi regarding the creation of mind-controlled Assassins. Dulles’ assistant was James Warburg. [9]

The Atlantic Union (AU) was an RIIA affiliate founded by Cecil Rhodes- who dreamed of returning the US to the British Crown. In 1939 AU set up its first offices in America in space donated by Nelson Rockefeller at 10 E 40th St in New York City. Every year from 1949-1976 an AU resolution was floored in Congress calling for a repeal of the Declaration of Independence and a “new world order”.

Another RIIA affiliate was United World Federalists (UWF)- founded by Norman Cousins and Dulles assistant James P. Warburg. UWF’s motto was “One world or none”. Its first president Cord Meyer stepped down to take a key position in Allen Dulles’ CIA. Meyer articulated UWF’s goal, “Once having joined the One-World Federated Government, no nation could secede or revolt…with the atom bomb in its possession the Federal Government would blow that nation off the face of the earth.” [10]

In 1950 James Warburg, whose elders Max and Paul sat on the board of Nazi business combine IG Farben, testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, “We shall have world government whether or not you like it- by conquest or consent.” The AU and UAF are close to the CFR and the Trilateral Commission (TC)- founded by David Rockefeller and Zbigniew Brzezinski in 1974. [11]

The TC published The Triangle Papers which extended the “special relationship between the US and Western Europe” to include Japan, which was fast becoming creditor to the rest of the world. Former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker was TC Chairman. TC/CFR insider Harvard Professor Samuel Huntington, who most recently has argued for a “Clash of Civilizations” between the West and the Muslim world, wrote in the TC publication Crisis in Democracy, “…a government which lacks authority will have little ability short of ­cataclysmic crisis to impose on its people the sacrifices which may be necessary.” [12]

The Illuminati

The Illuminati serves as ruling council to all secret societies. Its roots go back to the Guardians of Light in Atlantis, the Brotherhood of the Snake in Sumeria, the Afghan Roshaniya, the Egyptian Mystery Schools and the Genoese families who bankrolled the Roman Empire. British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli, who “handled” mafia-founder and 33rd Degree Mason Guiseppe Mazzini, alluded to the Illuminati in a speech before the House of Commons in 1856 warning, “There is in Italy a power which we seldom mention. I mean the secret societies. Europe…is covered with a network of secret societies just as the surfaces of the earth are covered with a network of railroads.”[13]

The Illuminati is to these secret societies what the Bank of International Settlements is to the Eight Families central bankers. And their constituencies are exactly the same.

The forerunners of the Freemasons -the Knights Templar- founded the concept of banking and created a bond market as a means to control European nobles through war debts. By the 13th century the Templars had used their looted Crusades gold to buy 9,000 castles throughout Europe and ran an empire stretching from Copenhagen to Damascus. They founded modern banking techniques and legitimized usury via interest payments. Templars’ bank branches popped up everywhere, backed by their ill-gotten gold. They charged up to 60% interest on loans, launched the concept of trust accounts and introduced a credit card system for Holy Land pilgrims. They acted as tax collectors, though themselves exempted by Roman authorities, and built the great cathedrals of Europe, having also found instructions regarding secret building techniques alongside the gold they pilfered beneath Solomon’s Temple. The stained glass used in the cathedrals resulted from a secret Gothic technique known by few. One who had perfected this art was Omar Khayvam, a good friend of Assassin founder Hasan bin Sabah. [14]

Hotel workers march on Labor Day

­por el personal de El Reportero

Trabajadores hoteleros y aliados marcharon frente al Grand Hyatt Hotel en S.F: para demandar fin a los abusos de los trabajadores del Hyatt en SF.  (PHOTO BY JULIA WONG)Hotel workers and community allies rallied at the Grand Hyatt in San Francisco to demand an end to Hyatt’s abuse of workers.  (PHOTO BY JULIA WONG)

Bay Area hotel workers rallied and marched last Labor Day to celebrate worker solidarity and protest abuse in San Francisco and Santa Clara. Hotel workers, members ­of Bay Area unions, religious leaders, and community allies highlighted the abuses of Hyatt Hotels.

Hyatt has distinguished itself as the worst employer in the hotel industry, garnering criticism for practices that include imposing dangerous workloads on room cleaners, firing career housekeepers to replace them with temporary, minimum wage workers, and turning heat lamps on striking workers in Chicago during a brutal heat wave. In Santa Clara, Hyatt workers are struggling to achieve a fair process to decide whether or not to form a union. In San Francisco, workers at the Grand Hyatt and Hyatt Regency are demanding the right to stand in solidarity with other Hyatt workers across the United States and protest Hyatt’s abuses, wherever they occur.

As convention season heats up, the disputes with Hyatt are escalating. Workers at the Grand Hyatt, Hyatt Regency, Hyatt Fisherman’s Wharf, and Hyatt Santa Clara have called for boycotts of their hotels, and workers at the Grand Hyatt and Hyatt Regency are preparing to go on strike again.

“I have chronic pain in my shoulders and elbows from cleaning 14 rooms a day,” says Antonia Cortez, a 35-year housekeeper at the Grand Hyatt. “In some cities, Hyatt makes housekeepers clean 30 rooms a day. We all work for the same company. I want the right to take action for Hyatt housekeepers no matter where they work.”

Other demonstrations took place in hotels during last years. In one of them, hotel workers rallied and marched to the San Francisco Hilton demanding a fair contract on Jan. 5. 2010. Over 100 protesters were then arrested for sitting in and blocking the doors. The action culminated in the launch of a boycott of the hotel, one of the city’s most luxurious.

 

The counterfeit culture -useful observations for understanding why collapse is inevitable

by Mike Adams

(NaturalNews) Through a devolving web of greed, self-serving power and a departure from fundamental ethics, Western culture has, over the last hundred years, become the counterfeit culture.

Nothing is real anymore — not the food, not the money, and certainly not the evening news. And because it’s not real, it’s not sustainable. That’s why it’s negoheaded for collapse, which is all too real, as many people are about to find out.

In the mean time, here are some observations about the counterfeit culture in which we all frustratingly find ourselves. It’s all about corporations, governments and institutions being “in the business of” counterfeiting something — faking something or pretending to create something of value when they really aren’t. Ring a bell?

The Counterfeit Culture

The Federal Reserve is in the business of counterfeiting money.

The mainstream media is in the business of counterfeiting news.

The pharmaceutical industry is in the business of counterfeiting medicine (Biopracy! They are stealing molecules from nature then counterfeiting their own patented variations.)

The medical schools are in the business of counterfeiting medical degrees. (When a doctor graduates from medical school, he still knows virtually nothing about nutrition.)

Doctors are in the business of counterfeiting false medical authority.

The mega-sized food corporations are in the business of counterfeiting food. (Processed cheese food product, anyone?)

The global consumer product companies are in the business of manufacturing counterfeit consumer products such a “baby oil” (which is really a petroleum product).

Social networks like Facebook are in the business of counterfeiting friends. (Please LIKE this article, okay?)

Cookie-cutter home builders are in the business of constructing counterfeit homes out of plywood, styrofoam and sheetrock… many these homes will not be standing in just 20 years.

The Pentagon is in the business of counterfeiting war. (Don’t have a war to fight? Bomb the World Trade Center and blame it on someone!)

Mainstream historians are in the business of counterfeiting history. (Everything you were taught about history in public school is a lie…) The globalist banksters are in the business of counterfeiting debt. (You thought it was money, didn’t ya? But it’s really just debt.)

And yet, things that are REAL are called fake

A man who recently stamped his own gold coins — out of real gold — was raided and arrested by the U.S. Treasury Department which announced that his GOLD coins were “counterfeit!” (­http://thewarningsigns.blogspot.com…)

After the drug companies stole the lovastatin molecule from red yeast rice to create their own statin drugs, the FDA tried to ban all red yeast rice as a dietary supplement, claiming it contained “counterfeit statin drugs.(http://www.naturalnews.com/030010_d…)

When the alternative media like NaturalNews and Infowars publishes real news that nobody else will publish, it’s called “fake” by the corrupt, openly bought-and-paid-for mainstream media (the OLD media).

Real is fake, fake is real

That’s how the world works today, folks: Things that are REAL — herbal medicine, gold coins, truthful journalism — are all called FAKE.

Meanwhile, things that are FAKE — the money supply, pharmaceutical medicine, myths of U.S. history and justification for war — are all called REAL.

Rigoberta Mench is presidencial candidate in Guatemala

­by the El Reportero’s news services

Rigoberta Menchu once more aspires to the Guatemalan presidency, this second time with a fully indigenous organization but joined to a leftist coalition.

The 1992 Nobel Peace Prize winner founded Winaq (integral human being) and registered it as a party. She then joined Alternativa Nueva Nacion and Unidad Revolucionaria Nacional Guatemalteca in a Broad Front, created last April 24.

The leaders and members of the last two groups approved the candidature of Menchu, who considers her participation a choice with different proposals, regardless of the results on Sept. 11. Latin News and Prensa Latina contributed to this report.

The Mexican government declared three days of national ­mourning after 52 people, mostly women, were killed when gangsters set fire to the Casino Royale in Monterrey in the middle of the afternoon of Aug. 25.

It seems almost certain that the gangsters did not intend to kill so many people, only to intimidate the casino owners by destroying their property.

The death toll, probably the second highest for a single incident (after the cold-blooded murder of 72 migrants in San Fernando, Tamaulipas on 23 Aug. 23, 2010 [WR-10-34]) appears to have shocked the government into changing its stance on organized crime. The government, which had previously argued that gangsters killed mostly other gangsters, now seems to be admitting civilians are also targets.

Chávez’s missing US$29 bn

The lengthy mystery over Venezuela’s executive controlled off-budget National Development Fund (Fonden) is gradually being solved by some tenacious opposition bloggers. Even taking into account the fact that these blogs are openly against the government led by President Hugo Chávez, the numbers as provided by the finance ministry don’t appear to lie.

Yet the Fonden doesn’t seem to have much of an economic impact. As one blogger surmises, “projects are drawn out for years, badly executed and the money is not being spent in the right areas, because the Chavista government prioritizes ideology (Defense, Cuba) over investment projects that generate jobs or infrastructure.

And even when they have these projects, after 12 years in power, they have not found a way to be effective and efficient. Corruption is being ignored!”

Secret Wikileaks documents confirms North American Union Plan

A secret document recently released by WikiLeaks reveals a high level U.S. ambassador promoting a merger of the United States, Canada, and Mexico into one combined consumer and labor market, with a common currency and a mutual electronic security perimeter with less focuson physical borders.

The secret documents reveal a well-developed plan that advocates secrecy, an incremental approach as not to alarm the public. The document clearly states, that the plan is to prevent U.S. efforts to protect citizens from terrorism or disease from interfering with commerce and other financial interests. The documents also advocate that promotion of this plan focus on “individual firms, industries or travelers, and especially consumers” instead of the nations as a whole.

This high level leak appears to validate earlier concerns by many groups of plans to create a new government, which would supersede the sovereignty of America, Canada, and Mexico in a way similar to the European Union. Critics of these merger plans call the plan the North American Union. Supporters of the plan call it the North American Community or North American Integration (NAI).

“It is conspiracy, but it is no theory,” said William Gheen of ALIPAC. “These traitors are trying to conceal their plans, but they are out in the open now. They are trying to force an economic union on America that is not ratified by the U.S. Congress, not authorized by the U.S. Constitution, and not approved of by the American public. This plan is being facilitated by the non-enforcement of our existing immigration and border laws.”

Americans were shocked to learn in 2005 and 2006 that millions of undocumented immigrants had been imported into America and were now marching in the streets demanding legalization, citizenship, voting rights, and taxpayer resources. Federal lawmakers loyal to the North American Integration plans have claimed “our immigration systems are broken” when in fact the immigration systems have been compromised by those advocating a merger of the populations of America, Mexico, and Canada.

Other examples of this economic union plan which has been pursued by Presidents Bush and Obama, can be found in the writings of Dr. Robert Pastor of American University, in releases by the Council on Foreign Relations such as “Building a North American Community,” and in announcements made by heads of state in all three countries supporting

the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP).

“North American integration requires American disintegration. Americans would never voluntarily enter into this devilish arrangement that would disintegrate the United States beneath a larger super state; and a new government which would destroy the existing U.S. Constitution and borders,” said William Gheen. “This is why these elite banking, business, and political influences are flooding  America with rampant undocumented immigration and hyper legal immigration.

They are conquering the freedom-loving innocent citizens of America by bringing in outsiders who will replace us incrementally in our jobs and homes.” While news of this recent WikiLeaks disclosure is circulating on the Internet, Americans for Legal Immigration PAC (ALIPAC) is releasing the news and documents to the nation today via national press release.

American citizens are encouraged to take appropriate steps to organize in defense of the nation, and prepare to politically challenge and defeat those pursuing this unlawful, unconstitutional, and nation-destroying agenda.

William Gheen is releasing a more detailed article today titled “WikiLeaks Releases Secret Files: North American Integration” which will be discns 2163816 tributed nationally along with this press release. American Disintegration for North American Integration Plan http://www.alipac. us/article-6305-thread-1-0.html Copies of the WikiLeaks documents can be seen at this link… Leaked Secret WikiLeaks Documents about Integration ­http://www.alipac.us/ftopicp1226350.html#1226350.

Boxing

­Friday, Sept. 9 — at Hinckley, MN (Showtime)

Mauricio Herrera vs. Hector Sánchez.

Lateef Kayode vs. Felix Cora Jr.

Saturday, Sept. 10 — at Wroclaw, Poland (HBO)

WBC heavyweight title: Vitali Klitschko vs. Tomasz Adamek.

Pawel Kolodziej vs. Ola Afolabi.

Sadam Ali vs. Boris Berg.

Saturday, Sept. 10 — at Atlantic City, NJ (HBO)

Yuriorkis Gamboa vs. Daniel Ponce de Leon.

Luis Cruz vs. Antonio Davis.

Thursday, Sept. 15 — at El Paso, TX (ESPN)

WBC featherweight title: Jhonny Gonzalez vs. Rogers Mtagwa.

Friday, Sept. 16 — at Buenos Aires, Argentina

WBA light welterweight title: Marcos Maidana vs. TBA.

Saturday, Sept. 17 — at Las Vegas, NV (HBO-PPV)

WBC welterweight title: Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Victor Ortiz.

Vacant WBC light welterweight title: Erik Morales vs. Lucas Martin Matthysse.

Craig McEwan vs. Kassim Ouma.

Saturday, Sept. 17 — at Los Angeles, CA (HBO-PPV)

WBC light middleweight title: Saul Alvarez vs. Alfonso Gomez.

Saturday, Sept. 17 — at Culiacan, Mexico

WBC middleweight title: Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. vs. Ronald Hearns.

Rally in support of Chilean student uprising

­by the El Reportero’s staff

Susana BacaSusana Baca

Join us in the fight against neoliberal policies in education around the world!

It’s Chile’s turn. Show up at the U.C. Berkeley Campanile in solidarity with Chilean students in this historic revolt.

Should education be a consumer good left to market forces? Or is it a civil right all societies should guarantee their populations? That is the central conflict behind this epic uprising. Show your support for equal access to quality public education by rallying with us!

Showing remarkable organization, creativity and power of debate, tens of thousands of students are holding rallies almost weekly.

At University of California, Berkeley at the campanile, on Saturday, Sept. 3, 2011 at 11:00 a.m.

Furious Force of Rhymes

Whatever your preconceptions about Hip-Hop may be, throw them out the window. Furious Force of Rhymes explores the stereotypes of swagger and bravado to reveal an irresistible unifying force of global significance.

Furious force had it’s festival premier in August 2010 at the Locarno International Film Festival. It is currently touring film festivals worldwide with official release dates yet to be announced. For all upcoming screenings, events, and news related to the project, At 7.30 p.m. on Thursday September 15, at La Peña Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave. Berkeley. Tickets will cost $5.

Susana Baca in Concert Afrodiaspora (new date)

Afro-Peruvian singer and Peru’s Minister of Culture, Susana Baca, was asked to appear in front of the Peruvian Congress on August 25 and the date cannot be changed. For this reason, the concert scheduled for August 25 at the Herbst Theater benefiting Instituto Familiar de la Raza has been rescheduled to: Thursday, September 29 2011. All tickets purchased for the show on Aug. 25 will be valid for the show on Sept. 29.

Susana Baca is one of the leading voices in today’s World Music and a key figure in the revival of Afro-Peruvian music within Peru. Her songs are poetic (with lyrics composed by some of Latin America’s premier poets, with whom she collaborates), rich with evocative imagery, and her voice is delicate yet soulful. In 2002, Susana Baca won the Latin Grammy Award for Best Folk Album, for her Lamento Negro CD besides a nomination for the Grammy as “Best World Music Album”.

On Thursday, Sept. 29, at 7:00 p.m. at the Herbst Theater at 401 Van Ness Ave. San Francisco. Advance tickets at ­www.cityboxoffice.com.

­

Actress Francia Raisa is nominated for the ALMA Awards 2011

by the El Reportero’s staff

Francia RaisaFrancia Raisa

Honduran-mexican actress Francia Raisa, who plays Adrian Lee in the series The Secret Life of the American Teenager, has been nominated for the ALMA Awards in the category ‘Favorite TV Actress – Leading Role in Drama’.

In that same category Cote de Pable (“NCIS”), Eva La Rue (CSI: Miami), Sara Ramirez (Grey’s Anatomy) and Sara Shahi (Fairly Legal) are also nominated.

This year, the 2011 NCLR ALMA Awards will be broadcasted on TV on September 16.

Francia Raisa was also nominated in 2009 to an ALMA Award during the second season of the series. Thanks to its high ratings, The Secret Life of the American Teenager is now in its fourth season and it can be watched internationally in Latin America and Spain. Along the series, Francia Raisa has shown her big talent by playing a rebel teenager who has been through a non desired pregnancy, a destroyed family and an unstable relationship that made her change her attitude towards life.

Born in the US, from a Honduran father and a Mexican mother, Francia Raisa began her career in the movie Bring It On: All or Nothing opposite Hayden Panettiere, besides her participation on Brenda Hampton’s series, The Secret Life of the American Teenager, she has starred in ABC Family movies, The Cutting Edge: Chasing the ­Dream and The Cutting Edge: Fire & Ice.

Pacific Rim, the newest by Guillermo del Toro

Ever since Guillermo del Toro left his position at The Hobbit, every project related to him has ended up by disappearing amongst pre-production or screenwriting problems. It is not going to be the long-estime expected At the Mountains of Madness which brings the Mexican director to the scene after Hellboy II in 2008, but the newest project also has monsters, and it is said, very familiar ones. Del Toro is officially confirmed for ‘Pacific Rim’, a production by Legendary Pictures, which will open in the Summer 2013 under the classification ‘PG-13’ (which means blockbuster targeted to the public at large), and with a script by Travis Beacham (Clash of the Titans). However, what has been published online is that the plot of Pacific Rim would serve as a basis for the reboot of Godzilla, whose rights belong to Legendary Pictures itself, which is not very happy with the first draft, made for the Japanese monster.

What is clear is that Pacific Rim gives Del Toro another opportunity to create sensational creatures and fully enter into science-fiction, something he knows how to handle with three fingers. If Legendary Pictures sells this later as a ‘variation of Godzilla’, that is another story.

For some children in Alabama there won’t be school bells

­by Soraya Schwartz
Hispanic Link News Service

It is possible that the children in Alabama, whose parents immigrated illegally to the US, do not attend school this year, following the passing of state law HB56, which demands schools to collect information regarding students’ citizenship.

The law, signed on June 9 by the Republican Governor Robert Bentley, will enter into force on September 1. An amicus curiae was presented before the court, together with a protest about the law’s provisions regarding education, by the National Education Association and the Alabama Education Association. Several civil rights advocacy groups adhered to the amicus curiae, including the National Council of La Raza.

“We fervently agree– and is stipulated by the Supreme Court– that every student has the right to receive quality public education, regardless their migration status”, said Alice O’Brien, legal advisor for the National Education Association. “The role played by the teachers is to teach our kids, not to report them”.

The law HB56 states that the teacher would commit a state felony if he or she doesn’t reveal information regarding the citizenship of the students.

The HB56 also stipulates that it is legal to detain any person who resides in Alabama, with a foreign looking aspect, to ask him or her to produce citizenship documents, and that any person who houses or protects an undocumented individual could face legal actions.

“This law reminds us to racist laws such as Jim Crow from Alabama and other Southern states”, said Bernard Simelton, head of the State Conference NAACP in Alabama. “HB56 is a contemporary attempt to legalize racism in Alabama”.

State announces voting initiative to replace death penalty in California by 2012

“From now on, the SB 490, authored by Senator Loni Hancock, gives the voters the opportunity to decide whether to replace or not death penalty for life sentence with no probation, and will be in the Appropriations Committee of the Assembly.

We have wide evidence that the death penalty system in California is dysfunctional and costly. Death penalty implies for Californian taxpayers an expense of roughly $170 million a year, while 46 per cent of homicides and 56 per cent of rapes stay unresolved in the state. The $4 million dollars that the state has spent in 13 executions since 1978 should have been invested in reinforcing the law to solve murders and in taking criminals off the street, and they should have also been assigned to schools for children.

California’s broken system risks as well to execute innocent people for crimes they didn’t commit. More than 100 people in the city have been mistakenly put in death row and many have been executed.

The oil and organized crime connection

by José de la Isla
Hispanic Link News Service

Drug cartels have drawn all the attention lately when it comes to crime in Mexico. But one crime recently came into public view that looks suspiciously like an extension of the drug trade.

The Mexican military, with a lot of U.S. support, is involved in fighting organized crime. The purpose is to disrupt supply lines, downsize crime organizations with apprehensions, and stem the drug flow. Yet without serious reform of the drug-consuming population, that’s unlikely.

Since 2006, this part of the international drug war has come at the cost to Mexico of 40,000-plus lives, mostly civilians, With the military intervention has come a rise in reports of human rights violations.

Yet some important busts have taken place and a number of capos have gone down. But what if instead of “drugs” the commodity was oil? In real terms and as a metaphor, both have been referred to as U.S. addictions.

Well, there is news on this front. There’s action from an investigation in the Mexican oil patch.

Mexico’s state-owned oil company PEMEX filed on June 2 a suit alleging some U.S. companies were trafficking in oil stolen from their fields. The suit was brought in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas in Houston.

The accused companies are the U.S. division of Germany’s BASF, Murphy Energy, Plains All American Pipeline, SemCrude, Trammo Petroleum, Valley Fuels and U.S. Petroleum Depot, Western Refining. The suit alleges they participated in and encouraged the smuggling of stolen fuel.

PEMEX had already filed suit in the same court in June 2010, but in its new filing added three more firms as part of an initiative to combat the theft and smuggling of natural gas condensates from its facilities in northern Mexico, particularly at the natural gas fields in the Burgos Basin, the company said.

A “condensate” is sometimes called “light oil.” Petroleum (oil and gas and condensate) fluids are mixtures of many different hydrocarbons. The distinction with “oil” can be arbitrary. Both are “crude” in the sense their compositions are whatever comes from a well with no processing other than simple separation.

PEMEX claims that approximately $300 million of gas condensates had been stolen from Burgos Basin since 2006. Perhaps $250 million in oil was stolen in the prior four months, it reported June 16. In the recent lawsuit, the Mexican state-owned monopoly accused the companies of conspiring in the illegal activity with several organized-crime gangs that stole fuel from fields in the Burgos region in the northern border states of Nuevo León, Tamaulipas and Coahuila.

The criminals allegedly siphoned the gas condensates from storage facilities or hijacked tanker trucks and then moved the fuel across the border to the United States, mainly Texas.

In 2009, the news magazine Proceso reported that PEMEX was beginning to move aggressively after the heads of gangs specializing in siphoning the commodity from ducts. Specifically, the state oil company was looking for organized-crime involvement to dismantle those operations.

Organized crime got involved as part of its expansion from other crime franchises. Journalist Juan Alberto Cedillo has a new book, “La Cosa Nostra en México (1938-1950)” about how the present-day drug trade is the Frankenstein monster that began from a 1940s Cosa Nostra crime-syndicate operation. He says, “Criminal organizations have diversified their businesses, they no longer focus only on the sale of drugs, but also extortion, protection rackets, pirated goods, trafficking in persons, kidnapping, sale of adulterated alcohol or gasoline from PEMEX.”

Along the trade route, fences might act like middlemen, just as in drugs. When it comes to oil, they might not be professional racketeers. But like oil and condensate, it’s hard to tell the difference, and they don’t seem to care what crime group they have to deal with to get it.

[José de la Isla, a nationally syndicated columnist for Hispanic Link and Scripps Howard news services, has been recognized for two consecutive years for his commentaries by New America Media. His forthcoming book is “Our Man on the Ground.” Previous books include “DAY NIGHT LIFE DEATH HOPE” (2009) and “The Rise of Hispanic Political Power.”]